Work In Progress (Red Lipstick Coalition #3) - Staci Hart Page 0,130

beautiful dream turned nightmare. But that wasn’t how hearts worked. I wouldn’t find peace in a coma—my pain would be patiently waiting when I woke. So I lay there in my bed, testing the edges of the wound in my chest with tentative fingers.

I embraced every moment of pain, relished in the sick sensation. The pain was my penance.

I retraced my steps, marked every decision made, looking for the point where it had all gone wrong. Trying to map out how I’d gotten here. Somehow, my love for him hadn’t been enough. It hadn’t been enough to absolve me. It hadn’t been enough to guide me. My intentions, my designs, hadn’t mattered.

All that mattered were the consequences. There was nothing to regret except choosing a different path. It had seemed so innocuous, the path I’d been on. It had seemed right.

That was one thing Tommy had been wrong about.

It was me who was naive. My inexperience had led me down a road that ended in a trap door, the floor speared with spikes. And here I was at the bottom, looking up at the square of light I’d fallen from, wishing I’d done everything different.

My door cracked open, and I caught a sliver of Rin. When she saw I was awake, she opened it the rest of the way, her face bent in concern.

“Hey,” she said so quietly.

I didn’t speak.

She strode over, sat on the edge of my bed, searched my face. “Did you sleep?”

I nodded once.

For a moment, she just watched me, her face impossibly sad. “I am so sorry.”

And just like that, I was no longer empty. The hole in my chest filled with grief, spilling over the top. Tears, never-ending tears, fell without obstruction.

She didn’t speak, just laid a hand on my leg and held on to me.

At some point, the well of emotion emptied again. Rin handed me a tissue.

I gathered my strength enough to sit up, my hands slow and clumsy.

“What are you going to do?” she asked gently, handing me another when I’d spent the first.

I dabbed at my nose. “There’s nothing to do, Rin.” My voice was scratchy and rough from disuse.

“There is always something to do,” she assured me.

I shook my head. “Y-you didn’t s-see him. There’s no coming back from this. I’ve hurt him too badly.”

“But you love each other. There has to be a way, Amelia.”

Val’s voice came from the doorway. “She’s right. There’s always a way.”

She walked in with Katherine in her wake and took a seat opposite Rin. Katherine sat on the foot of the bed. The three of them watched me with too many emotions on their faces to count.

“There’s nothing I can say. He knows I love him. He knows I’d never hurt him. But in the end, that doesn’t matter, does it? It isn’t enough to rewrite the facts. I should have believed him. I shouldn’t have written about him. I shouldn’t have…” I dissolved again, wishing I could disappear, evaporate, vanish.

“Anyone would have believed the picture. That post was damning, Amelia,” Katherine said with matter-of-fact pragmatism. “It looked real, and coupled with the article and the fact that you’d fought…the conclusion wasn’t that much of a jump.”

“I didn’t even ask him. I didn’t trust him. I betrayed him in the most brutal of ways. I-I just didn’t know. He’s the only man I’ve ever been with, the only man I’ve ever loved. And I thought I understood trust. I thought I trusted him. But he’s right. When it mattered, when it came down to it, I didn’t. It’s just—” A sob racked through me, and I took a long breath, trying to calm myself. I couldn’t stop crying. “It’s just that I never really believed he could love me. I never believed I was enough for him. As much as I trusted him, there was always a part of me that didn’t think myself worthy. The thought of him sleeping with V-Vivienne didn’t take much imagination. And beyond that, I gave away his secrets. I sold him out.”

“But you didn’t mean to,” Val insisted.

“But that doesn’t matter.” I stated the fact with quiet certainty. “I did.”

“You can’t give up.” Rin shook her head at me, her brows drawn. “There has to be something you can do.”

“You have to fight for him.” Val’s lips were flat.

“How?” I cried. “What could I possibly do? How could I possibly make up for this? For all of this?”

“Tell him,” Katherine said. “Tell him the truth. Tell everyone the